Seltenreich-Hodgson and Ruck cap European swimming tour with silver medals

CANET-EN-ROUSILLON, France – Only an Olympic champion and world champion were able to beat Canadians Erika Seltenreich- Hodgson and Taylor Ruck on Sunday to conclude the three-stop Mare Nostrum swimming circuit.

In the women’s 400-m individual medley, Katinka Hosszu of Hungary, a triple champion in Rio last summer, took the gold in four minutes and 37.73 seconds with Seltenreich-Hodgson of the High Performance Centre-Vancouver, second in 4:39.64. Viktoria Gunes of Turkey was third in 4:40.33.

In the women’s 100-m backstroke, reigning world champion Emily Seebhom of Australia was the winner in 59.57 with double Olympic bronze medallist Ruck of HPC-Ontario second in 1:00.46 and Daria Ustinova of Russia third in 1:00.55.

The Mare Nostrum is an annual series with three two-day stops including ones also in Barcelona and Monaco. Several Canadian swimmers were here tuning up for the FINA World Championships set for next month in Budapest.

Fifth place finishes were also posted by Richard Funk of Edmonton in the 50-m breaststroke, Katerine Savard of Pont-Rouge, Que., in the 50-m butterfly and four-time Olympic medallist Penny Oleksiak of Toronto in the 100-m freestyle. Sandrine Mainville of Montreal was eighth in the 100 free.